When the castings or 'blanks' have been filed, cleaned and sanded, they are ready for polishing.  Polishing is frequently done by hand, particularly in the case of gold pieces, but is also done in small batches by tumblers which contain varying grades of abrasive shot.  This practice is necessary because hand-finishing is time-consuming and Rob works largely by himself, and doing all polishing by hand would be prohibitively expensive.  The tumblers speed production and keep Rob's prices down without sacrificing the handmade nature of the jewelry. 

Pieces are tumbled for several hours in the first tumbler to put the first level of polish on the metal.  At this point silver items are placed in an oxidizing solution which blackens the metal.  When the final polish is put on, recessed areas of the jewelry will remain black, heightening the contrast of the piece.  After oxidizing, the jewelry is put into the second tumbler, where it is brought to the second stage of polishing or 'satin finish.'  A satining wheel is used on hand-finished items, as in the photo at the right.  Any pieces which require gemstones now receive them.

To set stones, the bezel is cleaned out with a rotary bit, and the stones are selected from Rob's wide inventory.  For more on the stones used in R.E. Piland jewelry, please see the Gemstone Information Page.  The stones are seated in the bezel, which is then crimped and smoothed by hand with a special set of tools to hold the stone securely in place.  This requires great hand and arm strength, and more often than not a lot of patience!

Once the stones are set, all silver jewelry goes to one more tumbler for a final polish.  The final polish on gold jewelry is always done by hand.

 

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